Actress Julianne Moore admits she spies on her children through Facebook and
Instagram. Beverley Turner, another snooping mum, says the parents
who care are the ones who spy

I always knew Julianne Moore was the smartest actress in Hollywood. She’s the red-headed mother-of-two in her 50s who still bags the best movie roles; The New York Times described her as “peerless in her portraits of troubled womanhood"; she’s a pro-choice activist, Planned Parenthood supporter and ambassador for Save The Children. She speaks out against Botox and plastic surgery; supported Barack Obama and absolutely nailed a scathing portrayal of Sarah Palin in HBO movie, Game Change. When asked by one interviewer what God would say upon her arrival in heaven she replied: “Well, I guess you were wrong, I do exist.” If you ignore the immense wealth, success and beauty, I like to think we’d have a lot in common.

That suspicion was confirmed this week when she confessed to checking up on her kids: “In my opinion you don’t get to have privacy when you’re only 16!”Cue shocked intake of breath from all those parents who are afraid to say ‘no’ to their kids and have forgotten that children are children and do not have adult privileges until they are, say, adults.

Perhaps it is different for her. Caleb, 16 and Liv, 12, who do, after-all, have a mother who is a mega-star which perhaps renders them a more likely target for in-genuine ‘friends’ and weirdos. But what Moore describes are the feelings of any caring parent. Talking specifically about online freedom she said: “It’s a scary world out there. I’m all over it with my kids. My son has a Facebook page which he uses but he also knows that his father and I – what they call, lurk – on it so that if we see something untoward we can talk to him about it.”

This the modern day equivalent of the diary under the mattress, except that more extrovert teenagers now have a larger audience to impress with their shenanigans and the more introverted feel pressured to play along. In a completely unregulated theatre of showing-off, prying parents may be the only thing that stops the ‘look-at-me’ generation from broadcasting the fact that they lost their virginity – or indeed, the actual act of doing so. The previous generation’s ‘neglected’ children were the ‘latch-key kids': the ones who let themselves in because no parent was ever home. Today’s equivalent are the ones who flick from webpage to webpage completely un-policed. The parents who care are the ones who spy.

Private communication has always been the thrill of choice for kids and teenagers: the scribbled note in the classroom, whispering behind a cupped hand, the curly telephone cord pulled into the coat cupboard. Being a grown up could largely be defined as finally being able to have a conversation without your mum listening in at the door. And with good reason – kids don’t always make decisions that are healthy, sensible or safe and access to potentially problematic images, issues and ideas has never been easier than it is today.

Beverley Turner and her children

The tragic irony is that more and more parents are shielding their kids from the imaginary horrors of the real world, whilst allowing them private intercourse with the cyber version. I’m almost alone amongst my peers in letting my 10-year-old son walk round to the local park (without his own mobile phone – shock horror!). He adores the sense of independence and freedom – and, no doubt, a break from his nagging mother. I reckon he’ll accept a bit of snooping when he’s older in exchange for this sense of responsibility.

But when I ask my friends why they won’t let their children do the same, they can’t really explain it except for looking ashen and mouthing: “Paedos.” Yet their kids are allowed largely unmonitored internet access and they’ll be the ones letting them teenagers’ Instagram, Facebook and tweet to their private heart’s content once the hormones kick in. Perhaps because this is all so new, it is as though today’s mums and dads just haven’t thought this stuff through.

Worrying about physical dangers is of course completely normal. Moore admits to following Caleb on the New York underground to check he is safe. She says: "When my son first started to take the subway, my husband and I used to follow him to make sure he was all right, and then we had to stop following him and let him do it by himself.”

That’s not prying, that’s sensible. My son and I have crossed the road to that park a thousand times as I bang on about stopping, looking and listening. I trust his judgement. But it will be a long time until I trust his judgement on relationships and the moral maze of living in a big city in the twenty-first century. Luckily, he has me and his dad to spy on him for that.